between you and me
by tints
Summary: "don't you miss it? having a family?" or the one where caroline says it's okay to be human sometimes. set during 4x07.


**disclaimer:** i do not own anything.

one of these days i will write something completely shippy for them. inspired by _ tell me the story of your life, and how you thought you would never fail_. title from elton john's _i guess that's why they call it the blues_. set during 4x07.

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**BETWEEN YOU AND ME  
**

"Okay, _fine_," she laughs. "I've always wanted a rabbit. And before you even ask, I'd call it Thumper. But now I kind of don't even want one."

"Because you -"

"Yeah! Isn't it, like, immoral to have a pet of the same animal that you eat?"

Klaus shrugs, grinning. Caroline shakes her head, glancing off to the side, her eyes trying to track a lone wolf in the small crowd by the dance floor. She finds the smile slip from her face when she can't spot him. He's disappearing more and more on her these days, and despite it being a ruse, it feels a little too real for her to swallow.

She's waiting for him to say something about her tapping veins underneath flesh rather than fur, but Klaus seems to take his time, eyes wandering all over the backyard of the Lockwood mansion. She knows he's looking for him, too, just to add the salt to the wounds a little more.

"Since we are having a little heart-to-heart, how about we make this a little more about you?" Klaus says, raising his eyebrows in the only way Klaus can raise his eyebrows and make it look like he's halfway to becoming a human again. It's endearing, and Caroline hates it, how she thinks he's actually being genuine when everything he does is some ploy to get closer to gaining his goal of more hybrids and world domination. He looks away, as does she, bracing herself for the inevitable awkward and invading question she will rebuff him on. "How's your mother been?"

She frowns, glancing at him. "My mother?"

"The lovely woman who keeps this town a safe haven. That would be your mother?" He teases. She almost pushes her fist into his shoulder, but she remembers herself before her hand can even leave her lap. Placing her wine glass down by her feet, she collects herself while trying to understand his motives. She's finding it harder and harder to pin him down the more she gets to know him.

"She's ..." Caroline doesn't know. She hasn't bothered to ask. She hasn't made time to ask. Being caught up in the web of the doppelganger becoming a vampire and the cure is a damaging one, and Caroline's finding she's paying the price - her sitting with the devil being very much one of them. She places a hand down on the bench between them, finding her fingers almost brushing his leg. Inching them away in what she hopes goes unnoticed by him, she looks back out towards the dance floor, eyes searching for a dark mop of hair, "She's okay, I guess. Busy trying to keep people like you off of the streets."

"Ah," he says. She doesn't need to look at him to know he's smiling. "Must be quite the challenge."

"Hmm."

Klaus glances down. She watches him from the corner of her eye, not quite trusting herself to remove her gaze from him completely. "But I was referring more about your father."

Caroline's eyes turn to the grass. She starts counting the blades. "She's ..." Looking up, Caroline doesn't watch him from the corner of her eye. She doesn't believe he'll understand it, how she and her mother relate to one another. It hurts that there are air pockets sitting between them, but, at the same time, she's glad for the distance. "It's complicated."

"Complicated?" he presses. She feels his gaze burning on the tip of her nose.

"Like bore-you-to-sleep kind of complicated," she bites, narrowing her eyes at him.

"I'll pester you no more," he says, holding up his hands. Caroline doesn't spare him a glance, turning her head as far away as she can, but she can still see him, just as she always has since he saved her from the bite, even though she doesn't want to see him from her peripheral. He's everywhere now, in the shadows, in the crevices and corners, in the motivations of horrible plans concocted by her friends. He's slipping into her conscience and she's finding herself becoming more and more ashamed of playing him like he's some kind of finely-tuned fiddle.

He doesn't press any more. With the bottle of wine in his hands, he pours himself another glass. Caroline's sits by her feet, almost empty; he doesn't make to fill it up, but he places the bottle beside it.

She waits until time passes, where she can hear the laughter of someone she doesn't recall the name of to break the comfortable, yet tense, silence between them. "Don't you miss it?" He doesn't reply nor does she wait for him to ask what it is she's referring to. He doesn't play dumb by pretending he's not on the same wavelength as her. For someone who doesn't know her favourite colour, he seems to get her better than the people who have known her since the day she was born. She looks at him, her eyes sitting somewhere along his shoulders, "Having a family. One that's kind of genuine - one that isn't _manufactured_."

Klaus remains silent.

"I mean - no offense or anything - but I'd miss it." She _does_ miss it. Telling him, though, is allowing him a little piece of her she hasn't even given to Tyler. "Having a mom and a dad and brothers and a sister who, like, care about you so much they'd do anything to make sure you were safe or happy."

Toneless, he looks over her shoulder, "My family is nothing like that."

"Aren't they? I mean, you've got two of them out and about travelling the world and doing whatever it is an Original does, but they're - you know. You're you. They're them. I would've expected you to be six feet under in a coffin again."

Klaus remains tightlipped, face tense. "My brothers care nothing about me."

"So why is it you're sitting here with me with your back completely open to one of them putting a stake in it?" She raises her eyebrows, pressing him this time. There's a line and she knows she's crossing it, but he allows her to, every time. From a toe over it to her entire body over it, she straddles a line no one else dares to approach. "I know you're not stupid, and you know I'm not stupid, and I know I'm not wearing sleeves so the whole idea of me having something up one is kind of redundant, but considering - well. We have one dance we always do and you're, like, kind of happy to do it even though you know it always ends with you leaving angrily."

She's not quite sure he gets it, but he does, following her train of thought in the one moment where he shouldn't. He knows she's bait, and she knows he should suspect her agreeing to this date with him is another ploy to put wood in his back, but he's still sitting with her, alone, slightly buzzed, and he doesn't even think to cover his hide.

"Why are you saying all of this?"

"Because." She thinks about leaving it at that, but Klaus isn't a kid, even when he behaves like one, and he needs to have his hand held while crossing the street when it comes to the most mundane of social things. "I might know what it's like to be lonely, like you're forgotten or something. You think no one cares, but you're just too blind to see that they do in their own way."

Sitting up straighter, Klaus narrows his eyes, trying to catch her gaze as his tone becomes hard, "They do not care about me, Caroline. And for you to assume -"

"You put them in coffins and took away years of their lives. I know I'd be pissed. But for two people who are pissed, they're really far away from you right now."

Shaking his head, he says, "You don't know Kol or Elijah -"

"Maybe not, but I know more than you when it comes to family." She shrugs. Leaning forward, she picks up her wine glass. "Food for thought."

Klaus looks down to the ground, mouth pressed into a tight line, but she sees him nod slightly, as if taking what she's saying on board. For someone who is almost as old as the earth, he listens to her like her word is the only one worth hearing. It gives her a sense of power, that she can somehow make him heel. She's not quite sure what to do with it, or if she likes it, so she leaves it alone, waiting for him to take the final low towards her rather than she to him.

"And I know you didn't ask, but I miss him. And it's okay if you miss them, too." Her eyes stay on the grass, sliding over the shininess of his black shoes, but she knows he's watching her, like she's something he hasn't seen despite his years of merely living. "Even if they hate you."


End file.
